Paula Broadwell is finally breaking her silence over her affair with former CIA director and retired Gen. David Petraeus because she says she wants to reclaim her “own narrative” and career. Broadwell, a former military intelligence officer and biographer, admitted to having an extramarital affair with Petraeus, whom she met while researching a book on his life. Petraeus, who is reportedly being considered by President-elect Donald Trump for secretary of state, later admitted he shared classified information with Broadwell.

Hordes of Japanese fighter-bombers swooped down from the sky onto the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor, killing thousands of soldiers and sailors, devastating the American fleet, and propelling the United States into World War II with extreme prejudice. Two and a half months of repairs were enough to put her back into service, where she became a workhorse of the Pacific fleet for the rest of the war.

An Alabama inmate coughed repeatedly and his upper body heaved for at least 13 minutes during an execution using a drug that has previously been used in problematic lethal injections in at least three other states. Ronald Bert Smith Jr., 45, also appeared to move slightly during two tests meant to determine consciousness before he was finally pronounced dead at 11:05 p.m. Thursday — about 30 minutes after the procedure began at the state prison in southwest Alabama. Alabama uses the sedative midazolam as the first drug in a three-drug lethal injection combination.

Young artists, musicians and educators were among the victims of the deadly warehouse fire that broke out in Oakland over the weekend, killing several dozen attendees of a party in an art space. According to Alameda County Sheriff’s Deputy Tya Modste, 36 bodies had been recovered as of Sunday from the dilapidated, two-story Oakland warehouse known as the Ghost Ship. The San Francisco Chronicle has reported that the teenage victim was Draven McGill, a junior at Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts and the son of a deputy for the Alameda County sheriff’s office.

By Isabel Coles MAKHMUR, Iraq (Reuters) - Wearing a camouflage cap over her headscarf, Miaad al-Jubbouri cuts an unusual figure among the hundreds of men fighting to retake a village from Islamic State in northern Iraq. The mother of five was the sole woman among a joint force of Iraqi army and tribal militias who attacked the village of Kanous on Wednesday - one of multiple fronts in a campaign to drive the insurgents from their remaining strongholds in Iraq. Like the men around her, Jubbouri said her motive for taking up arms was hatred of Islamic State, which overran large parts of the country more than two years ago, meting out brutal punishments and killing its opponents, including several of her cousins.

The father of the knife-wielding 14-year-old shot by a cop at a Nevada high school has come to his son's defense, saying he was reacting to relentless torment from bullies. "He was being bullied," Justin Clark wrote on Facebook Wednesday. The teen was filmed with two long kitchen knives in startling video footage posted to social media after a fight reportedly erupted between two boys at Reno's Hug High School.

Michael Alan Williamson is serving a life sentence for armed robbery and assault and battery with intent to kill. Breaking overnight two major manhunts are under way this morning in this south South Carolina. Prison officials are looking for Michael Williamson who they say broke out of McCormick correctional institution.

Pakistani military helicopters on Thursday, Dec., 8, ferried remains of plane crash victims to the capital, Islamabad, as aviation authorities said they opened a probe into the crash that killed 47 passengers and crew the day before in the country’s northwest. The small twin-propeller aircraft was traveling from the scenic mountain resort city of Chitral to Islamabad on Wednesday when one of its engines failed shortly after takeoff and crashed in the hillside village of Gug in the district of, according to Pervez George of the Civil Aviation Authority. The plane belonged to the Pakistani national carrier, the Pakistan International Airlines, and had 42 passengers and five crew members on board, PIA spokesman Daniyal Gilani said.

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen proposed Thursday that the children of illegal immigrants should be refused public school places as part of tough proposals to restrict state services for foreigners. "I've got nothing against foreigners but I say to them: if you come to our country, don't expect that you will be taken care of, treated (by the health system) and that your children will be educated for free," Le Pen said. Opinion polls suggest the leader of the National Front (FN) will finish second in next year's presidential election, but she is hoping for new momentum after Donald Trump's victory in the United States.

Months after heavy flooding destroyed parts of North Korea’s northeastern region in late August and early September, Kim Jong Un’s regime has termed the disaster recovery after mass mobilization a “miraculous victory” for the East Asian country. The heavy rains triggered by typhoon Lionrock in late August and early September led to severe floods in North Korea, leaving hundreds of people dead and tens of thousands others stranded. A mass mobilization movement, referred to as the “200-day battle,” has been credited for the “victory” on the “reconstruction front” in North Hamgyong Province, state-controlled news agency KCNA reported Wednesday.

New cars are often intimidating to first time buyers. The idea of debt is enough to scare most new-comers into a corner without much second thought, but does it have to be that way? Three of the nation's cheapest cars can be had for under $14,000, a sensible

Do us a favor, right now: Open a new browser window (it’s very important to us that you keep this one open, FWIW), type “gt500” into Google, and hit return. As in, a car that Ford hasn’t officially announced yet. Clicking on the link itself simply redirects users to the basic Mustang info page on the Ford website.

American flags hung from every pole and business in the small Mississippi town of Wesson as the remains of a 23-year-old sailor headed to his last resting place Wednesday, 75 years to the day after he was killed at Pearl Harbor. Fireman 1st Class Jim H. Johnston was buried with full military honors in his hometown. Local media report Johnston's remains were disinterred last year in hopes of identifying them through modern scientific methods, and were returned to Johnston's family on Tuesday.

By Hamid Shalizi and Josh Smith KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan and American officials are increasingly worried that any deepening of ties between Russia and Taliban militants fighting to topple the government in Kabul could complicate an already precarious security situation. Russian officials have denied they provide aid to the insurgents, who are contesting large swathes of territory and inflicting heavy casualties, and say their limited contacts are aimed at bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table. Leaders in Kabul say Russian support for the Afghan Taliban appears to be mostly political so far.

Ronald dela Rosa, director general of the Philippine National Police (PNP), is treated more like a rock star than a policeman. Aside from President Rodrigo Duterte, dela Rosa is the central figure in the country’s ongoing drug crackdown that began on July 1 — dela Rosa’s first day on the job, one day after Duterte took office. It has earned international notoriety for Duterte — and for dela Rosa, the title of country’s top cop.

Thousands of migrating geese have died after taking refuge from a snowstorm in toxic mine waters in the western United States, mine officials have said. As many as 10,000 snow geese descended on the abandoned open Berkeley Pit in Butte, Montana on November 28 and since then several thousand have perished, said Mark Thompson, environmental affairs manager for Montana Resources, which jointly manages the pit with the Atlantic Richfield Company. Thompson told the Montana Standard Tuesday that mine workers tried to prevent the huge flock from landing on the water -- which contains sulfuric acid and heavy metals -- by using noise makers, spotlights and other methods but failed to scare them all off.

Not every Grinch steals Christmas — some of them stab it.
Home surveillance footage from a St. Louis front yard recently caught a guy in the act of impaling Frosty the Snowman.
Read: Montreal Put Up a 70-Foot-Tall 'Charlie Brown' Christmas Tree, and Locals

By Dominique Patton and Steve Holland BEIJING/NEW YORK (Reuters) - President-elect Donald Trump will nominate Iowa Governor Terry Branstad as the next U.S. ambassador to China, choosing a longstanding friend of Beijing after rattling the world's second largest economy with tough talk on trade and a telephone call with the leader of Taiwan. Branstad has visited China at least six times, and Chinese President Xi Jinping has traveled to Iowa twice, including once while Branstad was governor.

Officer fatalities have increased by 20 percent in 2016, with more than 60 percent of police deaths resulting from a gun-related fatality, according to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund (NLEOMF), a national database that tracks the death toll of police officers within the U.S. As of Thursday, the NLEOMF reported 134 police officers had died so far in 2016 from a variety of incidents ranging from traffic accidents, fatal falls, plane crashes and health-related causes. Of those, 63 were caused by firearm-related incidents, including the shooting of Officer Nicholas Ryan Smarr, a Georgia police officer who was shot and killed Wednesday in the line of duty in Americus.

As I tap out this Lexus GS F review, I’m doing the insomnia thing in a hotel in Seville, Spain, hours before my first drive of the Lexus LC500, a roughly $100,000 luxury coupe. With its audacious show-car styling—a welcome light in the tunnel for Lexus’ currently murky design language—the LC500 also spotlights the mission of Akio Toyoda, the Toyota chairman, “master driver,” and Lexus chief branding officer, to purge Lexus of boring cars once and for all. As Lexus reminds us in Spain, Toyoda’s 2011 trip to the Pebble Beach car show was spoiled by collectors and media giving him an earful over Lexus’ approach to luxury, which has long prioritized serenity and bulletproof quality over exciting design and performance.

Alfa Romeo announced Thursday that its new sedan, the Giulia would start at $37,995 (without destination fees) here in the U.S. of A. All-wheel-drive is available as a $2,000 option on both cars, and buyers can also add Alfa's $1,250 "Sport Exterior Package" if they're looking for some colorful brake calipers and 18-inch sport wheels. Both the entry-level Giulia and the Ti will arrive on sale in January.

Repealing President Barack Obama's health care law without a replacement risks making nearly 30 million people uninsured, according to a study released Wednesday. Separately, a professional group representing benefit advisers warned congressional leaders of the risk of "significant market disruption" that could cause millions of Americans to lose their health insurance. Republicans dismiss such dire scenarios, saying that they are working on replacement legislation for a President Donald Trump to sign.

In an effort to combat illegal mining and logging, agents of the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Renewable Natural Resources, supported by military police, conduct operations in the municipality of Novo Progresso, Para State, northern Brazil

Russia said the Syrian army was suspending combat operations in Aleppo late Thursday to allow for the evacuation of civilians from besieged rebel-held neighborhoods, but residents and fighters reported no let-up in the bombing and shelling campaign on the opposition's ever-shrinking enclave. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, speaking in Germany after talks with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, said military experts and diplomats would meet Saturday in Geneva to work out details of the rebels' exit from Aleppo's eastern neighborhoods, along with civilians who were willing to leave the city. Lavrov said the Syrian army suspended combat action late Thursday to allow some 8,000 civilians to leave the city in a convoy spreading across a five-kilometer (three-mile) route.

Researchers have discovered the partial tail of a feathered dinosaur that was preserved in amber some 99 million years ago, according to a study released Thursday. "This is a new source of information that is worth researching with intensity and protecting as a fossil resource," said Ryan McKellar, one of the scientists who worked on the study published in the US journal Current Biology. Feathers dating back to the time of dinosaurs have already been discovered in amber, but this is the first time scientists have been able to definitively link a specimen to a dinosaur, researchers said.